Cape airport lands more round-trip flights to Chicago

The Cape Girardeau Regional Airport will offer more round-trip flights to Chicago on United Express, starting early next year, airport officials said Thursday.

The new flight schedule will take effect Jan. 7, said Joe Hobbs, chairman of the airport advisory board.

Hobbs said the expanded schedule will provide Cape Girardeau with three round-trip flights to Chicago Monday through Friday, and two round-trip flights on both Saturday and Sunday.

The new schedule will include stops at Barkley Regional Airport in Paducah, Kentucky, airport manager Bruce Loy said.

Cape Girardeau will have 19 round-trip flights weekly compared to the current dozen, he said.

Weekday flights will depart Cape Girardeau at 6 a.m., noon and 4 p.m. Weekend departures for the round-trip flights are slated for 6 a.m. and noon on Saturday and 6 a.m. and 4 p.m. on Sunday.

Utah-based SkyWest Airlines, operating as United Express, now provides two round-trip flights to Chicago from the Cape Girardeau airport, with one of those flights including a stop in Quincy, Illinois.

Under the new arrangement, Cape Girardeau will retain its direct noon flight to Chicago O'Hare airport, but the other two flights will include stops in Paducah before traveling to Chicago, airport officials said. There no longer would be a stop in Quincy in connection with the Cape Girardeau flights, Loy said.

United Express will continue to provide round-trip flights from Quincy to Chicago under a separate arrangement.

The flights from Cape Girardeau to Chicago with stops in Paducah will take about the same time as the flights stopping in Quincy, Loy said.

According to a SkyWest news release listing the new flight schedule, it will take nearly three hours to fly from Cape Girardeau to Chicago with a stop in Paducah. The plane will be on the ground in Paducah for about 30 minutes before heading to Chicago, according to the flight schedule.

Officials at both the Cape Girardeau and Paducah airports announced the new schedule at simultaneous news conferences in their cities.

Speaking before a crowd of city and civic leaders at the Cape Girardeau airport terminal, Loy said he expects to see increased boardings, particularly as a result of having more weekend flights. Currently, there is only one outbound flight on Saturday and no return flight that day, he said.

"That is one huge difference," Loy said.

The federal Department of Transportation (DOT) approved the new schedule Wednesday, he said.

Under the Essential Air Service program, the federal government subsidizes air passenger service to Cape Girardeau and other small airports. At the news conference at the Cape Girardeau airport which was attended by city and civic leaders, Loy said the DOT normally subsidizes 12 flights a week.

"In this situation, SkyWest was able to make changes without having to ask for additional money," Loy said. The airline already is serving Paducah and Cape Girardeau, but under different subsidy contracts.

Barkley Regional Airport marketing director Eddie Grant said the arrangement will boost the number of weekly round-trips from Paducah to Chicago from 14 to 19.

The expanded flight schedule should boost boardings at the Cape Girardeau airport, Loy said.

He said that "frequency (of flights) trumps everything" when it comes to airline passenger business.

Loy said the Cape Girardeau airport has seen increased boardings since United Express began providing flights last December.

The airline offers flights on 50-seat aircrafts. The previous passenger service, Cape Air, provided round-trips to St. Louis on much smaller airplanes.

There were 854 boardings at the Cape Girardeau airport in June and 915 in July, according to Loy. He has projected boardings of more than 960 for August.

The subsidy agreement with SkyWest to provide air service to Cape Girardeau runs through November 2019.

mbliss@semissourian.com

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